UGT: 2nd Terrana 280 a.G.A. / 11:08 a.m.; seconds before the ASF Aurora joins the battle

  Location: FSF Defiance, deep inside the Mau-Rut'Zion System (orange dwarf), Inner-Noran sector, Ruidan Raider Association, Milky Way

  The FSF Defiance shuddered under another impact, its reinforced plating groaning under the strain. Shields at 22%. Not great. Admiral Thorrison steadied himself against the armrest of his chair, eyes locked on the tactical display as the battle continued its slow spiral toward the inevitable. The enemy had played them well. They had suddenly jumped out of hyperspace nearly inside his own formation, far deeper than the Admiral's officers had believed possible even with perfect knowledge of the system. And they had struck hard, with the fleed stranded in a gravitational sinkhole.

  The fleets hyperdrives were worthless here. The Admiral couldn’t retreat, couldn’t reposition, couldn’t do anything but slug it out in a battle of attrition that they were already losing for several hours now. And that had been their plan all along. Well, at the very least he'd been able to slow the Associations advance and their own losses down to a crawl. His only hope was that Commander Ashcroft and Cpatain Lunaris would be back earlier than expected.

  Admiral Thorrison ground his teeth as another warning flashed across my screen. One of his Destroyers had just been lost, its reactor breached, torn apart in a violent explosion. Another was barely holding together, its armor stripped down to exposed framework. Even the FSF Defiance was hanging on by the slimmest of margins, its hull already breached in two different places. The Association, on the other hand? Their ships weren’t unscathed, but they had a clear advantage.

  Admiral Thorrison exhaled sharply, mind racing. He had to buy more time, there was no other option. But how? Scanning the battlefield, he searching for an opening, an oversight, a mistake he could exploit. But the Association had left nothing to exploit. His last option was quite a risky gamble but the Admiral wasn't going to just sit there and watch his people die! "Get me firing solutions on their lead Destroyer. Push forward, just enough to break their formation."

  A sharp nod from my weapons officer. "Aye, Sir." The FSF Defiance surged forward, struggling under the strain forcing the battlecruiser into motion. It wasn’t much. Just a few degrees forward, a slight shift in angle. But it was hopefully enough for the FSF Defiance to breach the Association formation and give the remaining fleet one more opening to retreat. The survival of the FSF Defiance itself was by no means guaranteed. But the Admiral would make them bleed for every meter they tried to take.

  Suddenly a warning blared across the bridge. "Sir, we hace a hyperspace signature on the radar!" his Lookout Officer called out. Admiral Thorrison's head snapped towards the tactical display, heart hammering. No. That wasn’t possible! Not here. Not in this mess of gravitational anomalies. By now nothing, not even the Association, should be able to jump into this zone! But something had. Suddenly, it dropped into realspace, brute-forcing through the gravitational field like it was nothing. And the Admiral recognised the ship instantly. The FSF Aurora.

  For a short moment, he just stared. It wasn’t possible. It shouldn’t have been possible. The forces at play here should have torn their hyperspace calculations apart. Should have sent them spiraling into the void or shredded them across a million different exit vectors. But they had done it anyway. The First Federation technology had prevailed and done so without any obvious complications. Admiral Thorrison's hands tightened into fists as he watched the super battleship stabilize from its jump, its shields flaring for a brief moment before settling into a steady pulse.

  The Association was surprised as well. They hesitated for just for a second. But hesitation, no matter how brief, was a weakness and now they were fighting against the most ruthless Captain he knew. After all, Captain Lunaris had just taken the field. Instantly, flashes of antimatter detonations lit up the battlefield as the FSF Aurora’s missiles tore through Association formations, moving like a swarm of predatory beasts. Shields buckled, hulls crumpled, and entire ships disintegrated under the onslaught. A single volley had done more damage in seconds than the Admiral's fleet had managed in hours.

  “Admiral, enemy forces are faltering!” one of his officers called out. “Their formations are breaking, multiple ships attempting to disengage.” Cowards. The Association had come into this battle with overwhelming numbers, had pushed us into a corner, fully intending to crush them. And now that the tide had turned, they had the audacity to run?

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  “Reorganise our fleet and counter-attack. Do not let them escape,” Admiral Thorrison ordered, voice steady and calm. “Coordinate with the FSF Aurora and press the attack.”

  The officer hesitated. “Sir, should we attempt to capture-”

  “No,” the Admiral cut him off. The SHF might have prioritized capturing enemy ships for their own use, but there was probably no way for them to stop Captain Lunaris from destroying every enemy ship this time. And indeed, Captain Lunaris was already ahead of them. The FSF Defiance’s sensors struggled to keep up with the sheer speed at which the FSF Aurora dismantled the opposition. One enemy cruiser was cut apart by these strange disintegration beams before it could even react. Another lost shields in seconds as its energy reserves were siphoned dry. The moment the Aurora’s railguns fired, another ship simply ceased to exist, its remains reduced to expanding particles.

  “This isn’t a battle anymore,” one of Admiral Thorrison's officers murmured. “It’s a slaughter.” The Admiral said nothing. Because his officer was right. The battlefield had fallen silent, leaving only the wreckage of the Association fleet as evidence of the carnage that had unfolded minutes ago. Fires burned where oxygen still lingered, glowing embers in the void. Twisted hulls drifted, their structures buckled and torn apart by the relentless firepower of the FSF Aurora. Even the wreckage itself felt wrong. The Association fleet had been shredded, its ships not just disabled but annihilated. It was very likely that there were few to no survivors.

  Admiral Thorrison exhaled slowly, forcing his grip on the armrest to loosen. The bridge of the FSF Defiance was quiet, almost eerily so. Everyone was still processing what they had just witnessed. "All enemy contacts neutralized," one of his officers finally reported, her voice subdued, as if speaking too loudly might shatter the unnatural silence. The Admiral leaned back, scanning the tactical display. His fleet had obviously taken damage with the Cruiser and Battlecruiser having suffered multiple direct hits, one of his Frigates was and one of his Destroyers had been lost just before the Aurora had intervened.

  The Admiral had known how powerful the FSF Aurora was. After all, it already had wiped out a fleet such as this one before. But this time, the FSF Aurora had clearly been stronger than last time. That meant until now, Captain Lunaris had been holding back. And the FSF Aurora was clearly more powerful than shown until now. "Open a channel to the FSF Aurora," he said. A short wait. Then, Captain Lunaris appeared on his display. She looked untouched. Unbothered, as if the annihilation of an enemy force and all the deaths had meant nothing to her. The cold glow of the Aurora’s Bridge cast subtle shadows on her face, making her expression even harder to read. In the background, her crew was active doing... something. It was hard to see through the strongly pixelated background. But what stood out most to him, there was no cheer. No triumph like you would expect after a won battle. For the FSF Aurora and its crew, this seemed to be a standard procedure, nothing else.

  "Admiral Thorrison," she greeted, voice as smooth as if they were discussing routine logistics.

  "Captain Lunaris," Admiral Thorrison stated flatly. "First off, thank you for your timely help. But still, that was… effective."

  She tilted her head slightly, but the barest trace of amusement flickered in her eyes. It didn’t reach her voice. “Efficiency is a virtue.” A pause. A long one. "I dealt with a threat to my mission accordingly."

  The Admiral leaned forward slightly. “Your ship’s performance exceeded all expectations. Even mine. And it was more then we had expected, given what you showed us until now.”

  She barely reacted. Like it was a given. “I’d hope so, seeing how we updated our weapon systems in the last months,” she said simply. Her voice was too neutral. Not arrogant, not even boastful. Just matter-of-fact. It sent a chill down the Admiral's spine. When did they even have time to upgrade their weapons!? They were nearly permanently engaged and they must have done so solely with the things they already had on board. A terrifying thought. “Then perhaps the Federation should adapt. You know what I ask for in exchange for my help in this war,” Captain Lunaris continued. Blunt. Cold. The way she said it, it wasn’t a suggestion. It was a statement of inevitability. It probably was. She knew her own value very well.

  “I wonder,” the Admiral mused, voice even, “how much of that was the FSF Aurora and how much of it was you.” Did he try to get a reaction or some indicator of their true strength out of her? Yes. Because he wasn't so sure about knowing what Captain Lunaris was capable off and what not anymore.

  For the first time in their discussion, the Captains lips curved slightly. It wasn’t amusement. It wasn’t even smugness. It was knowing. "Does it matter?" she asked. And that was an answer in itself.

  "What is with Commander Ashcroft and the fleet I put under your command?" he finally asked.

  "They'll be here in a few hours. After all, they cannot use the rather untraditional route I used," she stated flatly. "If you'll excuse me now, I still have to take care of a few things. We can talk more later."

  And with that, Captain Lunaris cut the connection and left the Admiral with many questions, but few answers.